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Melting coins for scrap is illegal

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Psychlone
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15 Dec 2006, 1:34 am

http://www.usatoday.com/money/2006-12-1 ... htm?csp=34

Quote:
WASHINGTON — People who melt pennies or nickels to profit from the jump in metals prices could face jail time and pay thousands of dollars in fines, according to new rules out Thursday.

Soaring metals prices mean that the value of the metal in pennies and nickels exceeds the face value of the coins. Based on current metals prices, the value of the metal in a nickel is now 6.99 cents, while the penny's metal is worth 1.12 cents, according to the U.S. Mint.


:?



Fuzzy
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15 Dec 2006, 2:14 am

Pretty hard to make money off the pennies.. that 0.12 cents has to pay for transport and the cost of the smelting. After that, you have to consider that an american coin isnt pure metal. A penny is actually a sandwich of copper and zinc in the core, like an oreo. Zinc might actually be more expensive than copper, but it burns off(boils) at a lower temperature than copper melts at, so it is lost. So suddenly, your 1.12 cent penny is worth... 0.37 cents. You also lose some mass to oxides.

Nickle is nickle clad around copper, but the boiling temp of copper is much higher than the melting temperature of nickel, but you would still have to separate the two.